Toy telephones have proven to be an extremely popular category of toy products. For the most part, such toy telephones generally mimic conventional telephones of the type used in home phone systems. Thus, toy telephones have been provided by practitioners in the art having various ring functions, talking functions, light displays and phone dialing apparatus. With the advent of touch tone phones the dialing apparatus is generally replaced by types of push buttons similar to the tone operated telephones in the household system.
In addition to entertainment and amusement, toy telephones have often been provided with additional apparatus which provides an instructive or teaching play pattern. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,513,993 issued to Lindley et al. sets forth an EDUCATIONAL 911 TRAINING DEVICE having a toy telephone resembling a standard telephone which is operable in accordance with a controlling processor to repeat, evaluate and instruct a child user in the proper dialing of the emergency number (911).
U.S. Pat. No. 5,184,971 issued to Williams sets forth a TOY TELEPHONE RECORDER WITH PICTURE ACCUATED RECORDING AND PLAY BACK having a toy telephone equipped with a recorder operable by a plurality of push button assemblies. Depressing one of the push button assemblies produces a play back of a particular message stored in the recorder.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,103,452 issued to Wood sets forth a CHILDS TELEPHONE APPARATUS which is selectively connectable to home stereophonic sound systems. The telephone functions as a talking toy which utilizes for example a stereophonic sound system requiring a play back on two separate speakers.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,104,821 issued to Nakajima TOY TELEPHONE WITH BELL AND RECORDED MESSAGES having a recording device supported within a toy telephone. A plurality of recorded messages are stored therein. The toy telephone is capable of producing ringing sounds in accordance with a predetermined play pattern.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,609,508 issued to Wingate sets forth a TOY TELEPHONE WITH VISUAL DISPLAY FOR RECORDED MESSAGES having a toy telephone supporting an LCD display enabling an audio and image data to be recorded by parents or the like and to play such data back in response to manipulation of the buttons within the numeric keypad of the toy telephone.
U.S. Pat. No. 2,582,086 issued to Bessell sets forth a TOY TELEPHONE having a conventional telephone base and telephone receiving cradle. The toy further includes a finger dial apparatus and a ringing apparatus. The toy phone is operative to mimic the functions of a conventional phone.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,474,484 issued to Lemelle sets forth a DOLL USED TO TEACH CHILDREN TO USE THE EMERGENCY 911 TELEPHONE NUMBERS having a conventional doll supporting a toy telephone in the upper portion of the doll torso. The toy phone includes a tape player having pre-recorded tape of the words likely to be used by and emergency dispatcher at a 911 number, as the user pushes the sequence of buttons for 911 emergency the recorded tape is activated.
Several other devices operate in a similar manner using apparatus similar to the push button arrays of toy telephones for teaching purposes. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 3,958,344 issued to Lesiak sets forth a TEACHING AIDE FOR TEACHING NUMBERS: U.S. Pat. No. 5,026,288 issued to Castiglia et al. sets forth ILLUMINATED EDUCATIONAL BLOCKS while U.S. Pat. No. 2,500,507 issued to Avery et al. sets forth an APPARATUS FOR TEACHING FOR TYPEWRITING having a secondary keyboard configured in accordance with a conventional typewriting keyboard.
While the foregoing described prior art devices have provided improvement in the art and have in some instances enjoyed commercial success, there remains nonetheless a continuing need in the art for evermore improved amusing, entertaining and effective apparatus for teaching critical phone numbers to a young child.